New York SBDC Research Network

Featured in America's SBDC newsletter The U.S. Department of Labor announced the launch of the New and Small Business Assistance  webpage and the Compliance Assistance Toolkits webpage. These new online tools assist American small businesses and workers with simple, straightforward resources that provide critical Wage and Hour Division (WHD) information, as well as links to other resources. The webpages were established in response to feedback received from new and small business stakeholders voicing their need for a centralized location to secure the tools and information they need to comply with federal labor laws. These new webpages provide the most relevant publications and answer the questions most frequently asked by new and small business owners. These tools, in conjunction with worker.gov and employer.gov , ensure greater understanding of federal requirements and provide tools to help employers find resources offered by other regulatory agencies. Learn more .

By  Carmel Martin  and  Angela Hanks   Apprenticeships, paid training programs that combine on-the-job training and classroom instruction, are an effective yet underused strategy for training workers for in-demand jobs. In 2014, in an effort to increase the use of apprenticeship as a pathway to middle-class employment, President Obama set a national goal to double the number of U.S. apprenticeships within five years. Since then, the Department of Labor has made unprecedented investments to support the development and expansion of new and existing apprenticeship programs, announcing or awarding $265 million in funding, thanks, in part, to a historic, bipartisan agreement made by Congress and based on the president’s 2016 budget. As part of that initiative, the Department of Labor is  awarding 14 contracts  to industry and workforce intermediaries to advance two major goals for expanding apprenticeship programs in the United States: *expanding a...

Every week, millions of Americans work more than 40 hours but do not receive the overtime pay they have earned. President Obama is taking action to fix that: In a note to signers of a We the People petition, the President announced that tomorrow the Department of Labor will finalize a rule to extend overtime protections to 4.2 million more Americans. Check out the President's note . If you work more than 40 hours a week, you should get paid for it or get extra time off to spend with your family and loved ones. It's one of most important steps we're taking to help grow middle-class wages and put $12 billion more dollars in the pockets of hardworking Americans over the next 10 years. For generations, overtime protections have meant that an honest day's work should get a fair day's pay, and that's helped American workers climb the ladder of success. That's what middle-class economics are all about. But after years of inflation and lobbyists' effor...

 The U.S. Department of Labor announced a proposal to clarify federal contractors' requirements to prohibit sex discrimination. The recommended changes would revise the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs' guidelines to align with laws, court decisions and societal changes since they were originally issued in 1970. "Our sex discrimination guidelines are woefully out of date and don't reflect established law or the reality of modern workplaces," said OFCCP Director  Patricia A. Shiu . "We owe it to the working women of America — and their families — to fix this regulatory anachronism so there is no confusion about how federal contractors must comply with their equal opportunity obligations."

By Jennifer Kimmich, owner of the Alchemist Cannery, a brewery in Vermont. For nearly 30 years, I have worked in the service sector and in this time I’ve worked alongside the most dedicated, hardworking people I will ever know. These are the folks, many of whom are single mothers, who keep our businesses running day in and day out, cleaning our hotel rooms, working our front desks, and ringing up our coffee and gas in the morning. These are the hardworking Vermonters who, like all workers in the United States, need paid sick time. Years ago my husband, John, and I decided to offer paid sick days to our employees. To the surprise of many small business owners, it was one of the best business decisions we have ever made. See more in the US Department of Labor blog .

US Business Leadership Network companies recognize that the “gold standard” of disability-inclusive hiring starts with building the talent pipeline through effective partnerships. While internships have long been recognized as an essential strategy in this regard, since Disability Mentoring Day was launched as a White House Initiative back in 1999, mentoring youth with disabilities has also gained prominence. Today, Disability Mentoring Day is hosted annually by the American Association of People with Disabilities and celebrated on the third Wednesday of each October. During the 2011 USBLN Annual Conference, the discussion topic for the Industry Sectors Roundtable was, “How does your company develop the current and future applicant pipeline including young adults with disabilities?” Participating Fortune 1000 companies shared that their DMD involvement resulted in the recognition that mentoring youth with disabilities is a business strategy to increase sourcing of qualified future jo...

The U.S. Department of Labor announced two final rules to improve hiring and employment of veterans and for people with disabilities. One rule updates requirements under the Vietnam Era Veterans' Readjustment Assistance Act of 1974; the other updates those under Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973. For more than 40 years these laws have required federal contractors and subcontractors to affirmatively recruit, hire, train and promote qualified veterans and people with disabilities respectively. "In a competitive job market, employers need access to the best possible employees," said Secretary of Labor Thomas E. Perez. "These rules make it easier for employers to tap into a large, diverse pool of qualified candidates." "Strengthening these regulations is an important step toward reducing barriers to real opportunities for veterans and individuals with disabilities," said Patricia A. Shiu, director of the department's Office of Federal C...

Communities benefit when formerly incarcerated individuals are able to effectively reintegrate into their neighborhoods. But all too often, people who have been convicted of crimes face difficult employment challenges when they are released. Two out of three incarcerated adults had jobs before they went to jail, but we’ve seen that incarceration can reduce their earning potential by as much as 40 percent when they get out. If people are unable to secure jobs when they are released from incarceration, they cannot support themselves or their families – and there’s an increased chance that they will return to a life of crime. Nationally, recidivism rates are substantial, but for participants in the Labor Department’s Reintegration of Ex-Offenders program, the recidivism rate is just 14 percent. This initiative’s success is something we’re proud of – and poised to build upon. More here .

The U.S. Departments of Defense, Labor and Veterans Affairs, as part of their continued commitment to our Nation’s Service Members, Veterans, and their families, launched a new and improved National Resource Directory . This free online tool provides access to thousands of services, programs and resources at the national, state and community level. The Web site has a fresh look with many key features that include an improved search engine, Really Simple Syndication (RSS) news feeds, subscriptions to e-mail updates, and new subject areas such as “Homeless Assistance.” The National Resource Directory is designed to serve a broad base of users including transitioning Service Members, Veterans, Wounded Warriors, and their families and caregivers. In addition, it is a useful tool for service providers who support Veterans and Service Members, such as Department of Defense Recovery Care Coordinators and AW2 Advocates, Veterans Affairs Federal Recovery Coordinators, health care providers ...

On Wednesday, March 18, I attended a Federal Stimlus Package Town Hall Forum at the Lally building of the College of St. Rose in Albany, NY, one of a series of events put together by Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith and the New York State Senate; the local state senator, Neil Breslin, was the masters of ceremonies. I was surprised to find at 5:50 p.m. plenty of empty seats because I had heard that the first two events were standing room only; evidently, some folks knew that the program was going to start late. Soon enough, though, the room was packed. The head table had a half dozen agency heads or representatives, which made me think this was the only speaker; that would not prove to be true, as the total number of speakers exceeded a dozen and a half. First, Michael King narrated informaion along with this PowerPoint presentation . I was looking for the small businesss aspects. First to pop out at me was on page 17, which deals with labor, specifically the Workforce Investment A...

Rick Leibowitz, director of our North Country SBDC, recently shared this with me: http://www.labor.state.ny.us/ui/dande/sharedwork1.shtm This looks to be something that is worth investigating by some of our clients. It describes a NYS Department of Labor program that encourages employers to consider shifting staff to a four-day work week, with the employee earning qualified unemployment wages for the fifth day. It argues that rather than making wholesale layoffs, a company might be able to cope during a down period by essentially reducing its payroll by 20% for a given period of time. The theory continues that, once business improves, a company isn't faced with the costs of hiring and training additional staff. Has anyone had any experience with this, or had clients who've given it a try?